Matt House is entering his second season as the linebackers coach for the Kansas City Chiefs. Thus far, he’s been really pleased with the work that his unit has been able to accomplish despite the challenges presented by the virtual offseason.
“Yeah, I’ve been very pleased with the linebacker room and how they’ve embraced what we’re doing,” House told reporters on Thursday. “I think they’ve grown within our scheme during this time.”
In fact, House has enjoyed the challenges presented by the virtual offseason. He doesn’t feel like the linebackers, specifically, the rookies are missing out on anything right now. He feels like he’s actually getting a little bit more one-on-one time with rookies, such as Willie Gay Jr., than he would during the normal offseason program.
“Well, I’ll be honest with you, I haven’t really looked at it that way,” House said. “As coaches, our job is to adapt and adjust, and in the times that we’ve been in, that’s kind of what we’ve been doing. Really, it’s been great because I don’t know if you get this much individual meeting time normally because you are racing to get out on the field. So hopefully it clears up any questions that he has in his mind so that when we do get out on the grass, we can hit the ground running.”
You won’t catch House complaining about two more weeks of the virtual offseason program, which the NFL announced on Thursday. At the end of the day, House feels that teaching is teaching no matter the platform.
“Yeah, I think the good thing is it’s still teaching,” House said. “Coaching is just teaching. One of the things, we’ve had to use different platforms, but at the end of the day, you’re still teaching off of the same concepts and using video and using the different avenues you have available to yourself and the group. There’s some trial and error for sure, but all-in-all, it’s still teaching in my mind.”
Perhaps the positive impact from the virtual offseason program will allow for some changes in how NFL teams handle the offseason in the future.
